What Are the Impacts of Social Innovation? A Synthetic Review and Case Study of Community Forestry in the Scottish Highlands
Résumé
: In a context of political and economic austerity, social innovation has been presented as a
solution to many social challenges, old and new. It aims to support the introduction of new ideas
in response to the current urgent needs and challenges of vulnerable groups and seems to offer
promising solutions to the challenges faced by rural areas. Yet the evidence base of the impacts on
the sustainable development of rural communities remains scarce. In this paper, we explore social
innovation in the context of community forestry and provide a brief synthetic review of key themes
linking the two concepts. We examine a case of social innovation in the context of community forestry
and analyse its type, extent, and scale of impact in a marginalized rural area of Scotland. Using an
in-depth case study approach, we apply a mixed research methodology using quantitative indicators
of impact as well as qualitative data. Our results show that social innovation reinforces the social
dimension of community forestry. Impacts are highlighted across domains (environmental, social,
economic, and institutional/governance) but are mainly limited to local territory. We discuss the
significance of those results in the context of community forestry as well as for local development.
We formulate policy recommendations to foster and sustain social innovation in rural areas.
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